A burst of ‘popular’ culture to mull over the weekend, with the Guardian providing comment on the upcoming Alice in Wonderland. According to Xan Brooks :
the films of Tim Burton are not so much released as laid on, staged and mounted like lavish masked balls. The interiors are opulent and the tables piled high with all manner of intoxicating delicacies to eat and drink. With Alice in Wonderland, the director may well have outdone himself.
This government is like one of those old BZP party pills. It over promises then puts you in the emergency room. But you didn’t even feel anything.
I cannot wait to see Alice, Tim Burton is a legend!
I find it somewhat frustrating that Tim Burton seems to only be aware of the existence of one font 😉
I can’t wait to see Tim Burton’s new movie.
For me as a child on first learning to read on my own, Lewis Caroll’s tales of Alice’s adventures in Wonderland were the most charming and affecting of my child hood story books.
So much so, that I have learned by heart some of his couplets and as an adult can still recite them, (if called to.)
A little off topic, but I was inspired by the release of this new movie, to parody the ridiculous pantomime currently being played out in parliament between the two major parties around the rise on GST.
With my sincere apologies to Lewis Carroll and Tim Burton, here it is:
“It seems that when it comes to GST Tweedle Goff and Tweedle Key hardly ever disagree.”
I was moved to write this short one line couplet after I heard an interview with Phil Goff on The National Programme’s Waatea Radio, about a proposed Labour Party bus tour of the country, over Labour’s differences with the National Government’s plan to increase GST to 15%.
On being questioned about removing GST from food, Goff said, that there was no way that any future Labour Government would agree to remove GST from food.
It seems that if the Maori Party bill calling for the removal of GST from food is pulled from the ballot, Labour under Goff will join with National and ACT to vote it down.
On being further questioned, Goff also refused to be pinned down on whether a Labour Government would reverse National’s GST increase to 15%.
Thanks to this interview, and despite his planned travelling roadshow, Goff’s statements reveal that the difference between the Nats and Labour on GST, is in fact negligible.
On The Standard, Labour party supporters have long been arguing, that National’s GST rise to 15% (or more) is OK if the bottom percentile are properly compensated.
http://www.thestandard.org.nz/gst-up-it-depends/
and:
http://www.thestandard.org.nz/garner-poor-gst-compo-will-cause-backlash/
These are only two of several posts on this theme from Labour Party supporters on the proposed rise in GST.
Both Labour and National supporters concede that the low paid will be the hardest hit by the rise in GST, and Key has said he agrees with Labour about giving some sort of compensation to the low paid and beneficiaries for the rise.
It seems that the only apparent point of difference between these two parties, is that while Key and the Nats claim that the government’s compensation for those on low incomes will be adequate. Goff and the Labs are preparing to quibble about the amount and adequacy of National’s compensation package, (even though it hasn’t even been released yet!!?), claiming that a Labour Party compensation package would be more generous.
In my opinion, this debate is neither hear nor there, missing the main point in the debate over the rise in GST, which is it’s regressive nature. It is in recognition of the regressive nature of GST, that apart from two other countries, the vast majority of countries around the world that have this sort of tax, food is ring fenced from it..
And further, no matter how adequate the compensation for people on low incomes is, it can only be a one off benefit, as over time, inflation will eat away at it, leaving the low paid worse off in the long-term, as it seems that both National and Labour are comfortable with maintaining GST at 15% indefinitely.